They Have a Specialist for That...
So, silly me, I re-injured my right shoulder (again...it's been off-and-on for the past two and a half years) working out at the gym. But fear not! Now that I have health insurance, I can go to the Sports Medicine Clinic on campus and finally have my shoulder care of!
.....yep, apparently lifting heavy things and grunting qualifies me as an athlete. Who knew?
And bonus! It is summertime on campus (okay, it's summertime a lot of places), which means that there will be fewer students at the Health Center, which means it will be quicker and easier to get in to see someone at the Shangra-la-like Sports Medicine Clinic to finally have my shoulder taken care of!
I took some time this afternoon during a break to go to the Health Center to see someone about this pesky pain-when-I-use-it thing I have going on in my upper-right (your upper-left) quadrant of my body. Water bottle in hand (still using my right arm to drink it, from stupid absent habit), I went to the Sports Medicine Clinic on the bottom floor of said Health Center, eagerly anticipating getting some treatment.
"Oh, you need a referral from a doctor." Great! When is your Sports Medicine doctor available? "No, you should get a referral from a general practitioner." Argh...back upstairs to the main part of the Health Center, where this process of getting treatment for my right shoulder somehow involved taking my temperature and making sure my heart was still beating during "triage" (which is a French word, meaning "Yup, all the stuff you didn't come here for is fine").
After a wait, I got in to see a physician, who asked me why I had come. Stated bluntly, "I need a referral to the Sports Medicine Clinic because I exacerbated a pre-existing injury in my right shoulder....I think it's a problem with a muscle in my rotator cuff." Now, I am not a medical professional, so maybe there would be some complicated, medical-knowledge-heavy piece to all this of which neither I, nor the fine professionals in the Sports Medicine Clinic downstairs, would be aware of to accurately diagnose the precise issue at hand.
"Lift your arms the way you said gives you problems. Does that hurt? Okay, lift them that other way that you didn't mention giving you problems. Does that hurt? What if I push on your arms when you lift them this other way?" (at this point I got annoyed and "accidentally" expected her to push harder, so I lifted too hard for this little woman to stand in one place)
Diagnosis: "I think you may have injured a muscle in your rotator cuff. You need a referral to our Sports Medicine Clinic."
Really?! Because when was lifting my arms earlier, I said the same thing. Glad to see that I came here for this ever-so-necessary meeting. Can I get dressed now?
And so I have an appointment on Friday at the Sports Medicine Clinic. And, having spent almost an hour waiting for and telling someone wearing a white coat that I need to be here, I now have some sort of proof that I should be there. Because medical doctors are much better at knowing that what I say is true than lowly Physical Therapists.
On the plus side, it is yet further evidence that I am as smart as a medical doctor.
.....yep, apparently lifting heavy things and grunting qualifies me as an athlete. Who knew?
And bonus! It is summertime on campus (okay, it's summertime a lot of places), which means that there will be fewer students at the Health Center, which means it will be quicker and easier to get in to see someone at the Shangra-la-like Sports Medicine Clinic to finally have my shoulder taken care of!
I took some time this afternoon during a break to go to the Health Center to see someone about this pesky pain-when-I-use-it thing I have going on in my upper-right (your upper-left) quadrant of my body. Water bottle in hand (still using my right arm to drink it, from stupid absent habit), I went to the Sports Medicine Clinic on the bottom floor of said Health Center, eagerly anticipating getting some treatment.
"Oh, you need a referral from a doctor." Great! When is your Sports Medicine doctor available? "No, you should get a referral from a general practitioner." Argh...back upstairs to the main part of the Health Center, where this process of getting treatment for my right shoulder somehow involved taking my temperature and making sure my heart was still beating during "triage" (which is a French word, meaning "Yup, all the stuff you didn't come here for is fine").
After a wait, I got in to see a physician, who asked me why I had come. Stated bluntly, "I need a referral to the Sports Medicine Clinic because I exacerbated a pre-existing injury in my right shoulder....I think it's a problem with a muscle in my rotator cuff." Now, I am not a medical professional, so maybe there would be some complicated, medical-knowledge-heavy piece to all this of which neither I, nor the fine professionals in the Sports Medicine Clinic downstairs, would be aware of to accurately diagnose the precise issue at hand.
"Lift your arms the way you said gives you problems. Does that hurt? Okay, lift them that other way that you didn't mention giving you problems. Does that hurt? What if I push on your arms when you lift them this other way?" (at this point I got annoyed and "accidentally" expected her to push harder, so I lifted too hard for this little woman to stand in one place)
Diagnosis: "I think you may have injured a muscle in your rotator cuff. You need a referral to our Sports Medicine Clinic."
Really?! Because when was lifting my arms earlier, I said the same thing. Glad to see that I came here for this ever-so-necessary meeting. Can I get dressed now?
And so I have an appointment on Friday at the Sports Medicine Clinic. And, having spent almost an hour waiting for and telling someone wearing a white coat that I need to be here, I now have some sort of proof that I should be there. Because medical doctors are much better at knowing that what I say is true than lowly Physical Therapists.
On the plus side, it is yet further evidence that I am as smart as a medical doctor.
posted by CMA @ 7:48 PM
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